Travelling Facilities

Many airport lounges, business class and above, offer toilet facilities that are a little more than just functional. Some even have spas where you can be pampered before or after a long haul flight.

 

Certainly at Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport business lounge they used to have those toilets with the revolving seats which automatically cleaned and disinfected after use. A great idea, but a little unnerving the first time you come across it.

 

Origami on the shuttle

This is somewhat different to the tiny loos on aeroplanes. At one time there was a fifteen-seater shuttle service from Southampton to Amsterdam and back. Using the facilities on this tiny aircraft was akin to an origami puzzle as doors doubled up and made the compartment necessarily private!

 

Travelling to the Continent

Reviews for the loos on the Eurostar and the Euroshuttle aren’t good. Probably to do with the volume of users and the frequency of attendants but no one paints a favourable picture.

 

Luxury in every department

In complete contrast, travel on the Orient Express offers a superb experience all-round and this includes the mosaic tiled toilet facilities. Originally this line ran from Paris to Istanbul but now other routes are also available. You can even take trips on this great train without leaving the UK. And certainly all the facilities have an old world luxury that was expected by the original gentry who could afford it.

 

 

Travelling in Asia

Using the facilities in Asia, especially on trains, usually offers you the local ‘squat’ toilets. Basically this is little more than a hole in the floor, but many believed it was and is more hygienic as your skin doesn’t touch any unclean china bowl or seat.

 

Backpacking many years ago in India and joining the 11 million others using the trains in that country, the toilet cubicles in the Upper Second Class carriages were large. Above the Asian style toilets there were shower sprinklers so that you could also use the facilities to shower – welcome when you were travelling for days – and of course the water from the shower washed the toilets clean too.

 

One expert blog suggests, “for longer routes, the train is more comfortable (than a bus) and has WC facilities (clean at departure, dirty after 4 hours, stinky at the end).”

 

The Indian government is trying to introduce bio-toilets onto all their trains – we’re talking about something in the region of 50,000 coaches. This would deal with the waste ecologically and cause less corrosion to train tracks apparently too.

 

Travelling in style in India

The Maharaja Express is another old world luxury train that now covers many of the great tourist routes in India. All of the bedroom cabins on this train have en-suite bathrooms with showers.

 

At home

Just looking at a few of these options makes us pleased to be able to choose our own facilities in our homes. True most of us don’t entertain the number of people using public facilities, or have the capacity to keep them spotless. With a number of traditional and smart, contemporary toilets to choose from, we really are spoilt for choice.